become the thoroughfare, call for a full and satisfactory examination of
the whole space between Cape York and the southern shore of New Guinea,
and to this important service, therefore, you will devote the remaining
period for which your supplies will last.

In this latter survey you will cautiously proceed from the known to the
unknown; you will verify the safety of Endeavour Strait, and furnish
sufficient remarks for avoiding its dangers; you will examine the three
groups called York, Prince of Wales, and Banks, Islands; you will
establish the facilities or determine the dangers of passing through
those groups, and by a well-considered combination of all those results,
you will clearly state the comparative advantages of the different
channels, and finally determine on the best course for vessels to pursue
which shall be going in either direction, or in opposite seasons. Though
with this part of your operations Cook's Bank, Aurora Reef, and the other
shoals in the vicinity will necessarily be connected, yet you are not to
extend them to the 143rd degree of longitude, as the examination of the
great field to the eastward of that meridian must be left to some future
survey which shall include the barrier reefs and their ramified openings
from the Pacific Ocean. You are, on the contrary, to proceed, if
practicable, but most cautiously, in examining the complicated
archipelago of rocks and islands which line the northern side of Torres
Strait, till, at length, reaching New Guinea, you will there ascertain
the general character of that part of its shore, whether it be high and
continuous, or broken into smaller islands with available channels
between them, as has been asserted; or whether, from being guarded by the
innumerable reefs and dangers which are marked in the charts, it must
remain altogether sealed to the navigator. The nature of the country, as
well as of its products, will also be inquiries of considerable interest;
and you will, perhaps, be able to learn whether the Dutch have made any